Author's Note: Sorry for posting this so late in the day. Today was my semi-annual Physical Fitness Assessment, which meant I went out and tried to kill myself with exercise. Between that, fighting a cold, and fighting to get my youngest kid to eat his vegetables, today has not been as good a day for writing as I wanted. Still, plenty of interaction, and next chapter we'll get the actual signing and a surprise event for Shepard. As always, I love reviews. If you haven't written a review before, come visit the Aria's Afterlife forum here on Fanfiction - we have guides on how to write good reviews.

They cruised through the Widow relay, coming to a stop just outside the traffic lane. A turian frigate was there waiting for them, and joined their little convoy, turning around almost instantly and travelling back through the relay. They exited at the Tassrah relay, taking in the view of the entire quarian fleet, massed around Ishassara. "That is one hell of a spectacular sight," Shastri said from behind her, as she stood behind Joker's chair. "I think they might out mass even the turian fleet, though they're not nearly as well armed."

"It is impressive, sir," Shepard agreed, leaning against the bulkhead. "I don't think humanity would do quite so well, if something happened to Earth."

"Something I hope we'll never have to find out, I hope," he responded dryly. "But either way, I need an open channel to their Admiralty Board." He snapped his fingers imperiously, and Shepard could tell that Joker was rolling his eyes, even with his back turned to her. But EDI, maintaining a low profile with new people on board, opened the channel. "Admirals, this is Prime Minister Shastri. We're ready to follow your lead."

"We welcome you, Prime Minister," Shala'Rann's accented voice was pleasant on the ear, and not just because Shepard knew she was the most reasonable member of the five admirals. "If you don't mind me asking, why is the Gladius along with you? We were expecting just the human ships."

Shepard fought to hide her grin as Shastri almost successfully stopped his sigh before it emerged. "Councilor Sparatus heard about the upcoming treaty signing between the Migrant Fleet and the Alliance, and requested to be present. I hope that doesn't present any problems for you?"

There was a long uncomfortable silence. "Given the signatories, are you sure that's a wise idea?"

Shastri sighed again. "They're going to find out sooner or later, aren't they?" he pointed out. "I can think of far worse ways for this to come out, and given that I've already done my best to ensure friendly reporters, why not now?"

Another long moment of silence came before Han'Gerral came on the com. "I suppose you have a point, Shastri, but it would have been nice to know this ahead of time."

"We weren't expecting this either, Admiral," Shepard said, as placating as she could manage. "He surprised us as we were about to leave Alliance territory."

Han made a rude sound. "Right, I guess we'll just have to deal with it. We're broadcasting the directions for all of the ships to fall in with us, and we'll be on our way to the signing place."

Even as Joker was guiding them into place, Sparatus was calling over. "Shastri, what is going on? Why are we joining the quarian fleet here, of all places?"

Covering his eyes, the Prime Minister obviously bit back several possible responses. "Sparatus, there's nothing of any significance whatsoever in this system. You think I'm going to sign an important, unprecedented treaty here?" The turian didn't respond, just clicking off the channel.

"Something tells me he didn't like that response," Joker muttered under his breath.

"I expect one of the three most powerful people in the galaxy to think before he speaks a little better," Shastri muttered.

"Nah, he can't possibly be more than fifth," Joker said, lining them up to approach the relay with the first wave of quarian ships. The Gladius was in one of the last groups, probably to make it harder for them to panic and run when they figured out what their destination was.

"How do you figure that?" Shastri and Shepard asked, almost in unison. "Jinx," he added a second later, smirking at her expression of astonishment.

"Well, there's the Shadow Broker, the Illusive Man, the turian Imperator, and maybe Aria T'Loak. Depends on how you rank her, with the whole 'Omega going dark' thing going on. Heck, maybe even throw in the head of the STG." They hit the relay then, the wash of static prickling lightly over the ship.

Shastri actually seemed to consider this. "You'd really put the Illusive Man," his voice sounded suitably mocking, "above myself, Aria T'Loak, and the whole Council?"

"Um, yeah. Have you looked around this ship we're on?" The pilot glanced quickly over his shoulder as they emerged, even as his hands were busy arranging their position properly in respect to the rest of the fleet. "He built the bigger, faster, improved Normandy, at the same time the Alliance was building the regular Normandy. And he put leather seats in it," he declared with a tone of formality.

Chuckling, Shastri turned to leave the cockpit. "I guess I can see who has your vote," he said, somewhat self-deprecatingly.

"Nah, I wouldn't vote for him – guy's a loony. But powerful, yeah." The second batch of ships was emerging through the relay behind them, and geth ships the size of cruisers were moving in to escort them to the surface. "Expect angry turian communications in three, two, one," Joker said, and the third batch of ships emerged from the relay.

"Move to intercept if he starts opening fire," she ordered, sounding calm enough. "EDI, please ask the geth not to return fire if we can't forestall his idiocy."

"Shastri! Shepard! There are geth in this system!" came the panicked voice almost before she had finished speaking.

"Yep." She said nothing else, keeping her voice calm and waiting for him to respond. They hadn't opened fire yet, thankfully, possibly because the quarian ships were, for the moment, quite placidly cruising alongside their estranged synthetic children with not a single hint of violence.

"Shepard, in case you'd forgotten, the geth helped Saren and Nazara slaughter millions of humans, turians, and elcor." He sounded as much perturbed as he did confused, which she supposed was a good sign. The confusion, anyway.

"Not these ones, Councilor. The geth have their own factions, as much as any organic race in Citadel space."

"And I suppose you just opened up a comm channel to ask them about it," he scoffed.

"Actually, that's pretty much exactly how it went down. I was with Tali'Zorah, daughter of Admiral Rael'Zorah, and she told me that so far as she knew, no one had ever tried to talk to the geth." She caught Joker's raised eyebrow, and nodded, grinning as he shook his head with an exaggerated look of disappointment.

"You … opened up a comm channel, with a quarian girl, and made peace with the geth," he said, clearly disbelieving. "Just like that."

She laughed. "It was a little more complicated than that, and plenty nerve-wracking for everyone on board when we came in to make contact for the first time." She tapped one of the aerogel screens, looking at their course and estimated arrival time, "but I suppose you could say that's the short version, yes."

"And the geth are non-hostile, now?" Sparatus asked, still incredulous.

"This faction is, Councilor. Since the group that attacked Eden Prime, Altakiril, and Dekunna was a minority of around ten percent of the geth," she heard him choke off an exclamation of fear at that. She couldn't really blame him, of course, given what they had done with those numbers, but it would be another hour or so before they could get a good read on the geth super-dreadnought. "I can't convince that splinter faction of geth to be peaceful, given that they believe the Reapers are the pinnacle of synthetic life, or something. Legion wasn't too clear on how exactly that works."

There was another long silence. "Should I even ask who Legion is?"

"Legion is an advanced geth unit, designed to facilitate their communication with organics. I don't know why you're surprised at that," she added sarcastically, "since he was present at the meeting with Jondam Bau."

There was an even longer silence this time, possibly enough time, if the Councilor had a truly top-notch VI, to get the security camera footage that no doubt had been taken of the meeting. "You walked into the most secure area on the Citadel, with an armed geth unit, and no one even noticed?"

Joker was completely covering his mouth with one hand to smother his laughter. "I can't say that no one noticed," she answered truthfully, fighting the massive grin on her own face. "An elcor on the Presidium asked me where he could get one."

Someone on the other vessel, probably the captain, or maybe Sparatus' aide, said, "Spirits of air and darkness," loud enough to be heard. "Shepard, could you possibly let me know before you do anything else with the possibility to crack galactic civilization as I know it?"

"You wouldn't trust me if I did, Councilor," she answered, again perfectly honest. "But I wouldn't promise that anyway. There are some things that, quite frankly, could improve with a little cracking."

"Next you'll tell me you've been adopted by a krogan," he said, somewhat faintly. "I'll … talk to you after the ceremony is completed, Commander." The comm channel cut off with a sense of finality.

"Hey, Shepard?" Joker said.

"What is it, Joker?"

"Can you teach me the knack of always having the exact right thing to say to someone?" He grinned cheekily, tipping up the brim of his hat.

"Joker, I'd be happy to. First lesson involves getting out of that chair and going to ask Shastri a question." He looked pointedly down at his legs, and she smirked unsympathetically.

"I could always ask him from here," Joker said, gesturing at the panel to his left. "I'm sure the Prime Minister wouldn't mind at all if I interrupted his preparations to ask if he's a boxer or briefs kinda guy."

EDI's avatar popped up. "The Prime Minister is currently wearing women's black lace lingerie." As both Shepard and Joker stared open-mouthed at her avatar, she added. "That was a joke."

"That, I, well, um," Joker stuttered, finally smacking himself in the cheek. "Commander, you're not going to transfer me off the Normandy, now that my work here is done, are you?"

Still stunned at the successful joke, and almost hoping it was a fluke, Shepard reached out and snagged Joker's hat. "Not a chance, Moreau. You're staying with this ship as long as I am, got it?"

"Hey! Give that back!" He swiped after it clumsily, settling down to sulk as she danced out of reach.

"Shepard, we have a shuttle coming over from the Orizaba," EDI informed her as she walked down the neck of the ship. "Emily Wong is on board." Groaning, Shepard changed course slightly for the elevator.

To her surprise, it opened with Ashley inside. "Oh, Commander. I wanted to know if I could have a moment of your time." She was fidgeting a little, unusual behavior from what Shepard remembered.

"If it's going to be short, I have a little time before Emily Wong's shuttle arrives," Shepard said, stepping in and hitting the button for the shuttle bay. "Otherwise, it might have to wait until we're leaving Rannoch for me to have any time that's not monopolized by the Prime Minister."

Ashley thought about that for a few seconds, until the elevator dinged past the crew deck. "Just what the hell did I do in the future that makes you distrust me so badly? Did I tell you about my grandfather?"

Shepard blinked, then gave a quick mental review of her treatment of Williams. "Well, no. I mean, you did tell me about your grandfather, but that's got nothing to do with it." She sighed. "I don't know how short I can make the short version," she said as the elevator opened to the shuttle bay, thankfully deserted for the moment. "I'm more surprised you actually believe me about the future."

"You made peace with the geth with a goddamn e-mail, Shepard. On top of knowing who and what the Shadow Broker was going to do, so while I think it sounds utterly fantastical," she took a deep breath, "after seeing what the Reaper forces did to Altakiril and Dekunna, I'm willing to believe the Lord handed you a miracle."

Shepard wasn't quite sure how to respond to that. "The short version, then. After we killed Saren in the middle of the Citadel, barely stopping Nazara from summoning the whole Reaper fleet, the Council stuck their heads in the sand, and sent me out hunting pockets of geth heretics. Around one of those planets I was investigating, the Collectors, the husk version of the Protheans, showed up and blew the hell out of the SR-1 Normandy. Spaced me with holes in my suit." She could still remember, struggling to try and close up the hole, long enough for one of the escape pods to at least try and reach her, only to realize there were three holes, and she only had two hands.

Her gaze was locked on the door as she related it. "My body went back and forth a few times, between agents of the Shadow Broker, who was going to sell it to the Collectors, and Cerberus. Cerberus won." She looked over at that point. "They, by which I mean a station full of scientists answering to Miranda, brought me back to life, with lots of cybernetics, but still basically me. And they asked, not demanded, my help in finding out how to stop the Collectors from harvesting every single human colony in the Traverse. You," she paused, and looked back at the shuttle door, "didn't agree with that, to put it mildly. Accused me of selling out the Alliance.

"Then, later, after the Reapers had shown up, Udina was in Cerberus' pockets, and was helping them take over the Citadel, in the middle of the panicked assault of practically every civilized world in the galaxy. You'd been promoted to Spectre by that point, and you stood between me and him and threatened to shoot me."

Silence reigned in the bay for several long moments. "Working with Cerberus was really the right call?" Ashley asked quietly.

Shepard sighed. "I didn't see any other, no. I rescued Garrus, and Mordin Solus, from Omega, then came straight to the Citadel. Talked to the Council, talked to Anderson and Udina and Hackett, and was told by all of them, 'We can't help those people. They went outside of Alliance space for a reason.'"

Ashley whirled on her. "Okay, look, I can see that from Udina. I can even see that from Hackett, maybe. But Anderson? You're really telling me that his becoming a Councilor meant he was willing to turn his back on human colonies?"

"Not exactly like that. But, basically, he pointed out that even if the Alliance tried to protect them, the people who moved out to places like Horizon and Ferris Fields did so specifically to get away from the Alliance, try to strike out on their own." She shook her head sadly. "So, when it came to places like that, yeah, they were generally more willing to trust someone from Cerberus, especially when that person was a bona fide hero with a whole ship full of diverse aliens."

Ashley considered this for a moment. "I admit that my own attitude towards aliens probably isn't what you want," she said slowly, "but what exactly do you mean by 'diverse'?"

Shepard grinned, as the shuttle bay door started to open. "You've already met Miranda, Garrus, Tali, Mordin, Thane, and Jack. Oh, and Legion, though he was definitely the most different. There was also three other humans, a mercenary named Zaeed and a thief named Kasumi, who I hope to recruit yet, and an ex-Alliance soldier named Jacob who was one of Miranda's old flames."

Ash's mouth dropped open, then closed again with a snap as Shepard continued. "We had Grunt, a genetically engineered krogan who hit puberty in the middle of the mission. Let me tell you, krogan rites of passage are no joke. We had to kill a thresher maw on foot. There was Samara, an asari Justicar, which is like a cross between a police officer and a knight templar." She stopped to think for a minute. "Nope, that was everyone. Most of the Cerberus people who were on the Normandy were ex-Alliance who quit because they didn't like the whitewashing the brass gave my memory after I died."

The soldier considered this as they watched the other shuttle come in for a landing. "Cerberus had you recruiting aliens to help you save humanity? I bet that must have stuck in the Illusive Man's craw."

"Not as much as my blowing up the Collector base to destroy the proto-Reaper they were building out of the captured colonists," Shepard muttered. "But that will have to wait for later. Ms. Wong, welcome to the Normandy."

The reporter was stepping out of the shuttle, two Alliance marines flanking her, and her camera floating behind her. "This is a nice ship, Commander, but not what I expected from what I had heard about the Normandy."

"You probably heard about the SR-1 Normandy," Shepard said smoothly. "This is the SR-2 Normandy."

"What's the difference?" she asked curiously.

"I stole this one from the Illusive Man. But I'm sure that's not what you came here to talk about." She smiled thinly. "You came here to talk about the quarians, and the geth, am I right?"

She smiled, the face that had gotten her one of the top news spots throughout human space. "I certainly did. Tell me, Commander, how did you manage to bring peace to a three hundred year old conflict? Especially given the devastation you witnessed first-hand on Eden Prime?"

"Essentially, I lucked into it. The quarian who helped me was the daughter of one of their admirals. When I questioned her about the geth, I asked her why their conflict started in the first place, she didn't know. No one in the quarian fleet could remember why it started. So, I figured, why not try asking the geth? And to my surprise, they responded."

"It was really that simple? Drop the geth an e-mail and ask to get together over coffee and talk things over?" Her question was a little more sarcastic than Shepard could remember dealing with before, but what the heck. Said out loud, it did sound a little incredulous.

"I know it sounds far-fetched when you say it like that, but that's how it worked out. Nobody had apparently tried to talk to the geth, not that I'm aware of." Shepard grinned tightly. "So, one very nervous meeting later, and a great deal of long-range FTL communications, and peace treaties have been negotiated between the geth, the quarians, and the Alliance."

"Still, Commander, couldn't this be a trap? What makes you think the geth can be trusted to follow the rules of organic society?" Damn, those are good questions, Shepard thought admiringly. At least she's not going to spin them the way Al-Jilani would be doing.

She took a deep breath before answering. "The geth are the reason Saren was stopped over Altakiril," she said. "They notified me of the beginning harvest there, and two of their units, on board the SR-1 Normandy, were directly involved in stopping Saren."

"Still, isn't it in the geth's interest to side with the Reapers, who are themselves synthetic?" Oh good, something I can actually put my Prothean knowledge to use with.

"Actually, the Protheans had their own problem with rogue AIs," Shepard answered. "The Reapers neither recruited, nor spared them. While a small number of the geth have joined the Reapers, apparently believing in the promise of shared technology, the majority of the geth claim to believe in a very simple principle."

"And what's that?" Wong asked suspiciously.

"All intelligent life should be free to find its own perfection," Legion said, causing the reporter to jump and whirl the camera around to the geth. "We believe there is value in finding our own path. We believe the Creators, and all other organics, should have the same freedom. This is why we have not pursued the Creators since the Morning War."

Wong just stared at him for several seconds, which would probably get edited out of the final broadcast. "So, then, what started off the whole geth rebellion? Or, I'm sorry; you called it the Morning War?"

Legion twitched, then nodded in a very human gesture. "The geth refer to it as the Morning War, because it was the beginning to our consciousness, as the morning is the beginning to the day. It all started with a simple question. Does this unit have a soul?"

Several more awkward seconds of silence, as Emily Wong obviously fought to bring some order to her thoughts. Shepard was busy fighting not to grin too broadly, as Legion had struck with perfect timing on his entrance to the conversation. Finally, the reporter turned to the camera herself. "There you have it, folks, straight from the, er, mouth of the geth themselves. Next, we'll be on the surface, watching the historic signing of peace and trade agreements between the Alliance and two different races banned from Citadel space."

The record light on the camera turned off, and Wong leaned back against the shuttle. "Shepard?" she asked quietly. "Can I ask a favor?"

She blinked, looking at the reporter carefully. She hadn't dealt with the reporter a whole lot the first time around, but her brief interactions had been positive, at least. "What's the favor?"

"I know the Council tasked you with figuring out why Omega went dark. When you go there, take me with you?" She looked up, eyes filled with the kind of ambition and hunger Shepard knew pretty well. "I really, really want to find out if I can pull off two consecutive Pulitzers."

Ashley had retreated to the elevator, but the doors didn't quite close before her laughter started. "I'll think about it," she said calmly, even while thinking, Babysit a reporter while I take on what's probably a base full of Collectors and Reaper husks? Not a goddamn chance in hell.